SPLENT—is the term given to an ossified prominence when it appears upon the shank-bone of a horse's fore-leg: they are frequently seen upon the legs of young horses, and are sometimes known to disappear without any application whatever. If they do not make their appearance during the fourth or fifth year, they are seldom seen after that time, unless occasioned by blow, bruise, or accident. They are very rarely productive of lameness or inconvenience, unless they curve towards the back sinews, and vibrate in action. Various are the means too hastily and too rashly brought into use for their extirpation, and many times without the least necessity; for when they are not attended with pain or inconvenience, it must be more prudent to let them remain in a state of dormant inactivity, than rouse them into painful action. If some mode must be inevitably adopted, a spirituous saturnine solvent is the most safe and efficacious application.
SPORTSMAN—is the appellation, for time immemorial, annexed to any man whose partiality to the SPORTS of the FIELD are universally known: they are evidently marked out for him by the dispensing and benign hand of Providence, for the promotion of health, and the gratification of pleasure, of which, enjoyed with moderation and rationality, he is never ashamed. The name of SPORTSMAN has ever been considered concisely characteristic of strict honour, true courage, unbounded hospitality, and the most unsullied integrity. However the character may have been broken in upon by time, or mutilated by the innovations of fashion, caprice, or folly, the original stock was derived solely from the _blood_ of the true OLD ENGLISH COUNTRY ESQUIRE; who, uncontaminated by the curse of insatiate ambition, is only happy himself in the happiness of his domestic dependents, the corresponding smiles of his tenants who surround his mansion, and an hospitable association with his numerous friends.
His HOUNDS are kept from an instinctive attachment to the sport itself, as well as to perpetuate the respectable and exhilarating establishment of his ancestors, (hitherto transmitted to their posterity without a stain,) and not from the least desire of having his name blazoned through every part of the county in which he resides, for keeping what he has neither PROPERTY to SUPPORT, or spirit to enjoy. Personally frugal, (amidst the most spirited hospitality,) he never suffers his mind to be disquieted by the pecuniary applications of people in trade: having a soul superior to the idea of living beyond his income, and running in debt, it is an invariable maxim, never to let his tradesmen be a single quarter in arrear. The guardian of his own honour, he never affords a chance of its becoming degraded by the officious and unprincipled pride of a subordinate, under the appellation of STEWARD; or to be disgraced, or prostituted, by the barefaced, unqualified _denial_ of a menial bedaubed with lace and variegated finery, under the denomination of a _footman_.